75th Anniversary of sermon 'The Weight of Glory'

Yesterday marked the 75th Anniversary of the famous sermon given by CS Lewis 'The Weight of glory'.

It is a sermon that is a valued part of the files we have found during our research on honour and shame.

And it was encouraging to read a couple of articles at the Gospel Coalition here and here talking about it.

Here are a few quotes from that sermon:

As he speaks about glory as fame bestowed on those who belong to Christ…

"But not fame conferred by our fellow creatures—fame with God, approval or (I might say) "appreciation' by God. And then, when I had thought it over, I saw that this view was scriptural; nothing can eliminate from the parable the divine accolade, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant."  "

"In the end, that Face which is the delight or the terror of the universe must be turned upon each of us—either with the expression of conferring glory inexpressible or the expression of inflicting shame that can never be cured or disguised."

"Perhaps it seems rather crude to describe glory as the fact of being "noticed" by God. But this is almost the language of the New Testament. St. Paul promises to those who love God not, as we should expect, that they will know Him, but that they will be known by Him (I Cor. viii. 3). It is a strange promise. Does not God know all things at all times? But it is dreadfully re- echoed in another passage of the New Testament. There we are warned that it may happen to any one of us to appear at last before the face of God and hear only the appalling words: "I never knew you. Depart from Me." In some sense, as dark to the intellect as it is unendurable to the feelings, we can be both banished from the presence of Him who is presenteverywhere and erased from the knowledge of Him who knows all. We can be left utterly and absolutely outside—repelled, exiled, estranged, finally and unspeakably ignored. On the other hand, we can be called in, welcomed, received, acknowledged. We walk every day on the razor edge between these two incredible possibilities. Apparently, then, our lifelong nostalgia, our longing to be reunited with something in the universe from which we now feel cut off, to be on the inside of some door which we have always seen from the outside, is no mere neurotic fancy, but the truest index of our real situation. And to be at last summoned inside would be both glory and honour beyond all our merits and also the healing of that old ache."

Just this past week we have had opportunity to share the concept of eternal shame as what it means to be condemned to eternal death (Daniel 12:2), to two young men.  The impact once again was significant.  It is exciting to see how deeply the truth shared in the context of shame penetrates.  It reaches the heart in ways far greater than when physical death is talked about or when the context of guilt is talked about.  Our redemption is from more than just guilt…..it is also from shame (see a post at honorshame.com this week also about this)

The truth that CS Lewis shared in this sermon is significant and deserves not only wider readership but deeper consideration - especially in relation to sharing the gospel and discipling those in the Majority World.

You can read it on-line for free here.  We would greatly recommend it.